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Kate hailed a taxi and rode the six blocks uptown to her own apartment, clenching her teeth the entire time. An exasperating man, this Italian stallion. He barely knew her, yet acted as though he owned her. She wasn’t used to scenes like the one this morning. Wasn’t accustomed to so much drama attached to the simple, enjoyable, physical act of sex.

Captain Mikayla Jones opened the door and gazed up at the Skymaster II rocketing another group of pilots toward SFTC, the Space Flight Training Center. She’d been the instructor of most of the men and women on that flight and would come face to face with a new class on Monday morning. But she hadn’t rushed to the door to bid the squad farewell. No, instead she stared at the four men in uniform standing before her. She recognized three of them from the base, knew they hadn’t come with good news—they would never have arrived at her door together other than to inform her of a tragedy—but it was the fourth man dressed in black, his hands drumming a beat on his utility belt, who worried her the most.

Haldric sat in the darkness, lost in his illusion. His mind replaced the stone walls of the cell with the soft moss of a verdant forest glade. And he was not alone in the fantasy, Lexii was there with him. For an eternity, the only sound was his own heartbeat and her imagined whispers.

Voices beyond the door shattered the dream. Haldric reached out to grab nothingness.

“I said you don’t have to do the dishes.” Jazmin looked up from the floor, the shards of a dinner plate in her hands. “I could’ve done that pretty well alone.”“Your mom is sitting in the living room and made very clear she expects me to do the dishes because I was the one who ruined the dishwasher.”“Yes, my great warrior, not all things can be repaired by a kick.”